


In the End

by Veeksen



Category: Minecraft (Video Game)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Eventual Romance, First Fic on Here Idk What to Tag, It's the Comradery for Me, M/M, Team Dynamics
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-12
Updated: 2021-03-12
Packaged: 2021-03-20 13:40:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,349
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30005736
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Veeksen/pseuds/Veeksen
Summary: In the beginning, there was darkness.Dream, George, Sapnap, and Quackity have to find their way to the End. They need to do a few things first, and taking their obsidian to the surface is one of them. Darkness and monsters stand in their way.The team has each other's backs. Dream and George might have something more.
Relationships: Clay | Dream/GeorgeNotFound (Video Blogging RPF)
Comments: 1
Kudos: 2





	In the End

**Author's Note:**

> First fic in like...6 years?  
> A lil bit of something to get the juices flowing.  
> Where am I going with this? We shall see, I guess.  
> Not used to AO3 formatting. My apologies if it's rough.

## Chapter One

### In the Beginning

In the beginning, there was darkness. 

The kind of darkness that suffocated, congesting the air in such a stagnant black that left you with no sight, blind, and groping through your surroundings with a shaking, hesitant hand. 

The cold cave air smelled wet with mildew, adding to the clouding of the Dream Team’s senses. The scent told the group they weren’t far from the surface. Not close enough, though. _Still not close enough._

“Torch,” Dream demanded in a hissing whisper. He moved with as much haste as he could muster, listening to every echo of the cave. George, Sapnap, and Quackity were relying on him. He got them down there in the first place. He sure as hell could get them out. 

“You got us fucking lost,” Sapnap argued, the dense, purple stones of obsidian weighing heavily on his back. Each step he took jostled the material, tugging his leather bag downwards. His back fucking ached like hell. 

“So lost,” Quackity chimed in, bow in hand, arrow notched at the ready. Not like there was anything to shoot at when you couldn’t see shit. 

George said to Dream—sure that if he listened to anyone, it would be him, “The torch will give away our location.” They haven’t come across the grotesque form of a zombie since they started their ascension from the heat of the lava pools many miles below.

George could still remember the smell of rotten flesh violating his nose. He thought of Quackity’s arrow through the last monster. A perfect shot through the eye. Mucusy, dark green brain matter dripped onto the hard ground. 

“Swords up, we’re taking the risk,” Dream told them, words gentler than when he first spoke. “Now, _torch._ ” 

George heaved a sigh, fumbling in his pack for their last torch. His fingers wrapped around the coarse wood as he searched for the flint to light it. “I can’t see anything.” 

“That’s why we need a torch, idiot,” Sapnap said. 

“ _Watch it,_ ” Dream said in defense. He pulled his sword free of its sheath on his hips, the iron of it a weighted comfort in his callused hands. “Quackity, got the rear?” 

“You know it.” 

“Sapnap, on my four. We’re in a cavern,” Dream tightened his grip on his sword’s hilt. “Light it, George.” 

After two unsuccessful sparks, the Team’s surroundings went up in a blaze of orange, the torch tossing light onto the walls of the cave, revealing pale, damp stone and multiple tunnels branching off from the cavern, the shadows dark and threatening at their mouths. 

Dream spun in place, assessing his surroundings, sword raised above his hips. His heart thundered in his chest, the rush of blood in his ears so deafening, he didn’t hear the _clank_ of bones right before it was too late. 

The arrow whistled by his head, so close, it left a stinging trail high on his cheekbone. 

George ducked just in time, and the arrow sailed past them, scattering Sapnap and Quackity at the last minute, raising swears from them both. Quackity recouped in an instant, took aim, and let the iron-tipped arrow fly past Dream’s head toward the seven-foot-tall skeleton. 

The tip lodged itself between the skeleton’s ribs, meeting nothing but empty air where a heart should have been. Quackity lowered his bow and said, “ _Fuck._ ” 

Dream brought his sword up as a rebound, the edge of the blade connecting with the skeleton’s pelvis first before he tore his swing _up, up, up_ through the monster’s spinal cord, and into the gap of its ribs. The skeleton’s bones cleaved apart, shearing off its cartilage, and flew to disarray. Sapnap and George dodged the scatter of bones before the pieces of the skeleton settled to a halt on the cave’s soil. 

Dream gritted his teeth and said, “More will come. Let’s move.” 

“But where?” Sapnap asked. He took in the multiple entrances to the tunnels that stretched beyond. “I’m going to say it again, Dream.” 

“Don’t you dare say it again.” 

“You got us fucking _lost._ ” 

With one hand, George frantically searched in his bag for the tool that he knew would help them. In his other, the torch burned, casting intense heat to the side of his face. Sweat beaded on his brow. The chill of it dripped along his pale skin, soaking into the fabric of his sky-blue shirt. His iron armor asphyxiated him. Each breath was labored. _Too fucking hot._

Slender fingers met cool metal, and George yanked the small, silver compass free of the bag. He squinted at the dial, turned in his spot. “Left. We came from the east.” He gestured to a gaping mouth of the furthest tunnel. 

“Even George has more direction than you, Dream,” Sapnap stepped ahead of them, leading them away from the center of the cavern. The sword in his hand glimmered in the torchlight as he walked past George, his gaits confident.

“He has a fucking compass!” Dream exclaimed. 

At the mouth of the tunnel, Sapnap paused, hand up, signaling the Team not to press ahead. 

“What?” Quackity asked, voice loud enough for Sapnap to _shush_ him as he listened. 

Across George’s head, his eyes met Dream’s. “You hear it?” 

Muffled moans of the undead. Too many voices groaning with hunger, echoing down the cave’s tunnel until it met the Team at the entrance. The sounds made Dream’s heart rate skyrocket. Too many for the four of them to take on. 

Dread pooled in George’s gut. “You’ll get us out of here?” 

“ _You'll_ get us out of here. You have the compass,” Dream responded. One look at George’s panicked features in the flickering light made him change his tone. “I trust you. You got this, George.” 

“Guys!” Quackity exclaimed, and the remaining three turned at his call. He poised his bow, drawn-string pulled back to his cheek, brown eyes cast into the dark from which they came.  
George brought the light forward, the beam casting upon their previous path. He heard them. 

More of the undead. Their fronts wavered at the edge of the light. Quackity hoped like hell there weren’t any fucking skeletons. 

“ _Fuck,_ we are moving. RIGHT NOW,” Dream shoved ahead into the tunnel as Quackity released his notched arrow. The tip of it flew through the dark of the cavern, tip impacting in the flesh of a zombie, raising a wail from its slackened mouth. 

“Sapnap, upfront!” Dream barreled into the tunnel, George at his heels, illuminating the path in front of him. “Quackity, forget the ones behind us, cover our asses!” 

Sapnap ran next to Dream, sword at the ready as the four of them bound through the narrow tunnel towards the undead ahead. Groans grew louder as they passed branch after branch of caves, George directing them in shouts as they pushed their way towards the surface. 

At their fourth turn is when Dream saw them. The undead had hanging limbs, some broken at the joint, and their body’s rotting meat exposed through deep lacerations and other wounds. Many were missing chunks of muscle, and some had pale, sage-green skin rolling off their bones as if they were flayed. 

But the smell—hell, the smell is what hit them next, following the desperate moans of their slack jaws, black stumped teeth rotting in their mouths. 

They were disgusting—so fucking disgusting, that George swallowed a gag and forced his stomach to stop its roiling. He held the torch steady. The Team was relying on him. If the torch went out, they were fucking dead. 

Yet, it was the breeze that swept through the tunnel that sparked hope within the Team. A warm draft whistled above the undeads’ heads, tousling the Dream Team’s hair. 

Where the wind came, came a way out. The end to the caves rested just past the mass of bodies. 

“Georgy!” Quackity called, a smile splitting his face. Next to him, George beamed, relief lightening his features as he gripped the torch tighter, pride at his directional skills coursing through his veins. 

But, still—the monsters. Row upon row of them, further than the light’s edge. 

“How many?” Sapnap asked Dream, hands tightening around his sword. He stood rooted in place, ready to bolt into motion when they decided to make their move. 

Four yards away.

They let the zombies stagger their way forward as Dream assessed. “Only twenty. Quackity, sword out, we’re cutting as close as we can.” 

The zombies pressed. Three yards. Their smell became suffocating. 

“Five each, easy enough,” Sapnap said. 

“Maybe only two for you since you’re fucking slow,” Quackity said, casting his simple bow to the side as he drew his sword from the flimsy sheath at his hip. 

The zombies were close now. Too close for comfort. George started, “Guys—” 

“I am not slow—” A reverberating _thunk_ of an arrow connecting with the stone of the tunnel’s wall to the right of Sapnap’s head made him swallow his words. All of their eyes watched as the arrow fell to the ground at his feet. 

_Fucking skeletons._

George, Sapnap, and Quackity raised their eyes to Dream’s face, where he stood staring, wide-eyed at his team. With outstretched fingers, the zombies at his back reached for him, fingertips a foot away—

 _Six inches-_

“DREAM!” The three yelled in unison.

Dream’s only response was: “We’re running.” 

Dead fingers snatched at his collar. Dream pivoted out of the zombie’s grip and brought his sword up, the edge slicing through the flesh and bone as if it were a tender piece of steak. 

Thick, green blood spurted out onto Dream’s armor, the arm careening toward Sapnap. Dream brought his sword back up to slide the point into the neck of the zombie. He kicked the body away to free his blade and dove into the fray, Sapnap at his heels with George and the torch close behind, followed by Quackity bringing up the rear. 

The undead’s hands snatched at the Team, the zombies’ open maws snapping at their throats and face. Jagged, brittle nails cut lines into the Team’s skin, the sting of the wounds nothing compared to the press of the undeads’ forms; cold, clammy flesh bloated with decay flush up against their own bodies as the Team followed Dream’s path. 

Chipped, broken teeth lunged for George’s neck, and he stumbled, trying hard to keep the torch raised high as Sapnap’s sword cut a wound into the zombie’s neck. Frigid gore gushed onto George’s face as Sapnap severed the undead’s head. It toppled from its neck, the head falling to the ground only to be trampled by the other zombies’ feet. 

A strike here, a stab there—the Team took advantage of what little maneuverability they had, all to keep themselves moving. Their swords’ edges didn’t do much to fell the monsters. Wounds to the zombies’ torsos and limbs slowed, but unless the Team swung to decapitate or pierce the brain…the undead kept coming. 

Quackity cleared the rear with great swings, cutting the zombies at their knees, where they buckled and fell. Dream be fucking _damned_ —there were more than twenty of them. 

And the skeletons? _Where the hell were the skeletons?_

The brief thought cost him his focus. Searing pain shot up Quackity’s neck and down shoulder as stumped teeth clamped down hard on his neck. He swore, twisting the sword in his hands to bring the blade back into the chest of the zombie that had him pinned. The undead tore away, taking Quackity’s skin with it. 

Hot blood ran down his neck, and he back-peddled closer to Sapnap, where he reeled into him, making the man sway. Sapnap turned at Quackity’s weight, sword deflecting a zombie’s outstretched hand, eyes darting to the blood running down his teammate’s neck. 

Sapnap’s eyes searched the wound in the unsteady light of George’s torch. _Missed the artery._ They could make it. He snagged Quackity by the back of his armor and hurled him ahead of himself, pushing him toward George. He yelled, “How much further?!” 

“One more turn!” George called. 

“How many more zombies?!” _This wasn't twenty._ Did Dream know how to fucking count? 

When no one responded, and only the groans of the monsters echoed to him, Sapnap yelled, “Dream?!” 

Dream tore through body after body, his own form slick with his and the zombie’s blood. He turned right at George’s instruction and almost fucking wept at the sight that beheld him. 

_Light._ There—at the end of the tunnel. Bright sunlight leaked from the mouth of the cave, followed by a sweeping breeze that chilled the gore on his skin. He squinted toward it, determination and joy settling into his bones. 

George got them out. George got them _Fucking out._ He was going to sweep that man off his feet or kiss him on his god-damned mouth. 

Dream’s arms trembled with the exhaustion of swinging his sword. Sweat rolled off his brow, dripping into his eyes. He furiously blinked the sting of it away. 

Six more rows of zombies. There were definitely more than twenty—he felt like an idiot for not counting right. Granted, the torchlight only went so far, he told himself. He couldn’t have known. 

His arms quivered as he forced them to raise. He brought his blade down across the chest of one zombie, tearing the tip of his sword up to slice across the throat of the other that stood in his path. 

He did this once—twice more. The light was blinding now. He swore he could have smelled the grass just beyond the entrance’s mouth. He swore he could already feel it, plush and moist between his fingers. 

His team panted behind him as Dream cut through another row of the zombies. He teetered forward with his momentum. He saw bones mingling with the bloated flesh of the zombies. He saw skulls poke above their heads. 

Dream could make it through. 

Four more rows. 

_Three_ — 

Dream was only a few meters away from the exit when an arrow sailed toward him, burying itself to the right of his heart.


End file.
